Dear Slingshot:
I wanted to tell you all a little bit about how much we love our Slingshot Organizers. You know by now that they are totally ubiquitous in the scene; when they arrive we all cut out pictures from magazines and stuff and glue them on, and then cover them with packing tape because, let’s face it, those covers don’t last. Then a few weeks later we compare how each of our Slingshots conforms to the shape of our butts .
Did you know there is a really cool mountain bike called a Slingshot? Many consider it the first “full suspension” bike. Instead of a downtube it had a steel cable on a spring, and there was a fiberglass “joint” just in front of the seat post on the top tube, so it could flex. I guess they climb like demons, tho the joint bends in all directions, so they tend to walk around sideways a bit too. They still make them – it might be a neat illustration for a future issue.
I’d also like to thank you on a more personal level with the following unsolicited testimonial, which you may use as you wish. Maybe just call me Chris C. or something if you want to print it. It’s just a little story about love and revolution and my Slingshot organizer.
A bunch of us from Firecracker [Infoshop – in Worcester, Mass] went to Worcester Polytechnic to see Amiri Baraka speak. He was great, but through the whole thing I couldn’t take my eyes off this cool looking punk rock girl. You know how it is when you just kind of see someone like that – you’re all trying to figure out stuff about them. So all these things are going through my head, like that she’s alone, so probably isn’t there just for a class, and that she’s really into it and laughing at Mr. Baraka’s jokes at the expense of the government and such, so she’s probably clued in. So anyway, I say fuck it, I’m going to pass her a note. You only live once, right? So I’m all giddy and trying to figure out what to say, and make it so that my offer – to have tea with me is irresistible. So I pull out my Slingshot and rip out the previous week’s page (January 8-14 if you’re wondering) and ask her to tea and give my name and number. And then I have to sit through the talk all nervous, not nearly giving Amiri the attention he deserves.
So finally it ends, and I go over to near where she’s sitting, and see her bag which has an Avail patch on it. So now I’m totally sold, but when she gets up she goes to move around me and I look her right in her eyes (well, glasses) and say “Excuse me,” but all loaded with meaning and ready to give her the note, but there’s no flicker of recognition or lust or anything in her eyes, which was what I was hoping for, so I lose my nerve, and out she walks.
So now my friends are around me talking about the talk and what to do next and all, and I’m just like “Fuck this, I am such an asshole.” So I run around and chase her down outside and say “Excuse me, I think you dropped this . . .” and she says “I’m sorry?” and I say it again, and she is all confused because she has never seen that piece of paper before in her life, but she takes it and I walk away.
A week later I’m in the middle of cooking dinner for my house and entertaining an old family friend who is now a Unitarian minister, and the food is burning and the phone rings and it’s for me and guess what, it’s her. And it kills me to do it but I have to ask her to call me back, but she does and a couple of weeks later we go out for Indian food. There she tells me her side of the story, like how she was totally spaced out when I gave her the note and had no idea what was going on, and was going to throw it out but she didn’t pass a garbage can. And then she read it later and saw that it was from (I quote) “some sort of revolutionary datebook” and that was one of the reasons she called. So anyway that was a few weeks ago and we’re hanging out a lot and I just wanted to say “thank you, Slingshot,” and if anyone is lovesick I tell them “get yourself a Slingshot Organizer and be ready, because you just never know.”
Come visit us in Worcester if you’re on the coast. Thanks again. –Chris C.
p.s. Her name is Sue.